Even though his briefing Sunday was conducted via speaker, there was no missing the concern in the voice of David Nicosia, warning coordination meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Binghamton. He offered a storm update Sunday — via conference call — for regional officials, including those listening quietly in the Onondaga County emergency operations center at the John H. Mulroy Civic Center.

Once Hurricane Sandy collides Monday with the East Coast, it’s expected to touch off a storm that Nicosia and other forecasters say will be unlike anything they’ve seen in this part of the nation, for the raw scope of its reach. Our entire state is under a “high wind warning.” Whether that means big trouble for Central New York is tied to a fundamental question:

Will these winds be enough to knock down trees?

In this region, with its green canopy, the question can literally amount to life or death. In 1998, during the Labor Day storm, downed trees killed one man, caused serious injuries and resulted in millions of dollars in damage. Tens of thousands of residents went without power while utility crews labored to repair power lines knocked down by trees. One of the most terrifying sounds associated with the storm was the thud of heavy limbs, as they hit the roof.

Kevin Wisely, Onondaga County’s emergency management commissioner, said the local outlook for what’s being called “Frankenstorm” has gradually improved from last week’s early forecasts. Meteorologists initially expected Sandy to bring three or four inches of rain to this region, creating the potential for flash flooding. The forecast now is for about an inch and a half of rain, Wisely said, which means the tipping point in Syracuse between a near miss and potential disaster is just how fast and fierce the winds will blow.

As of Sunday, Onondaga County was on the outermost edge of what forecasters see as the bull's-eye of the storm, expected to hit Monday and carry into Tuesday morning. Forecasters say New York City is likely to get pounded. The state's Southern Tier and parts of Pennsylvania also seem to be at much higher risk than Central New York.

Still, the chances for trouble here are significant enough for Wisely and other officials to maintain their vigilance. According to Wisely, there’s a 30 to 40 percent chance this region will experience winds of 40 mph for roughly four consecutive hours, including gusts of up to 60 mph.

Nicosia expects power outages and other problems in areas where the storm reaches those levels. At this point, Wisely is not recommending the closing of local schools, although he advised residents to secure trash cans, lawn furniture, Halloween decorations and anything else that could be blown away. The high winds will be coming from the East in areas where storms more typically blow in from the West, and Nicosia and Wisely both wondered if such an unusual pattern might have an especially devastating impact on trees.

Don Leopold, a forest ecologist from the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in the late 1990s - roughly the same time as the Labor Day storm in Syracuse.Frank Ordonez/The Post-Standard

The real question is how hard those winds will blow. The trees most susceptible to being toppled or broken, Leopold said, are those whose crowns serve as “sails” that might capture severe gusts — especially such evergreens as the Norway Spruce, White Firs and Blue Spruces. While the danger is lessened for trees whose limbs are already bare for the autumn, Leopold said strong winds can threaten any trees that still carry leaves, such as willows.

“The worst (risk) is with anything tall, with a thick crown,” Leopold said.

His hope is that all these alarms will be moot, and the winds won’t be powerful enough for major damage. Still, Leopold has offered advice in the past to tree-lined cities torn apart by sudden storms, and he’s seen the havoc big winds can cause in an urban forest. While forecasters in Syracuse are warning us about a “wind event,” we all know the difference between a close call and a disaster: